Call-In Classic Christianity Radio – Bob George P536 (05-15-20)
Synopsis
You never want to get doctrinal truth from any other book besides the bible, the 66 books that we all the bible today. This book does not contain the ideas and thoughts of men, but came by way of the Spirit of God, revealing truth to men, that then came to be written down. And it was not through any man, but through the prophets of old and the apostles of God. The prophets heard directly from God and the apostles were eyewitnesses of all that Jesus did and said. Neither do you want to form doctrine by what men today say from their denominational persuasion. You test what every man says with the truth revealed to you by reading the word of God yourself while relying on the Spirit of God to teach you. Truth must be revealed by the Spirit of God, who must be living in you. The Spirit comes to live in you when you are born again, made alive spiritually by your belief in what Jesus alone accomplished for you by his death, burial and resurrection.
People call into the radio program asking about the heathen that has never heard, or what happens to a Muslim who believes in Allah. Is Allah the same God as the God of the Christian? These are the kinds of questions people ask still today. The God of the bible is called by many names, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Elohim and Jehovah and other names, but such names are all referring to the same God, who is Jesus, God in the flesh. The Muslims, the Mormons and the Jehovah Witnesses all deny the deity of Jesus, so they have made a God of their own imagination. And from scripture we know that there is no other name under heaven by which man can be saved, and His name is Jesus. To deny the deity of Christ is to reject Jesus, in who he said he is and in what he came to do.
Jesus did not come to form a religion. He came to solve a problem man has that he cannot solve. Man is dead and in need of life, spiritual life. Since the fall of Adam in the garden of Eden, all men are born dead spiritually, without the life of God in him. If any man should die in that state of spiritual death, then he is forever separated from God in a place called hell, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth and the fire never goes out. That is not God’s desire for man, and He is not willing any should perish.
Now the cause of that condition of death is sin. The wages of sin is death. So for man to have any hope at all for salvation from eternal death, God sent His Son Jesus to die in our place, to pay the price of death, the just punishment for sin that we could never pay. Being God in the flesh, having no sin of His own, He is the only person who has a life to lay down and a life to be raised again and given to men. The resurrected life in Christ Jesus, once sin is forever taken away from the eyes of God, which happened 2000 years ago on a cross, is now offered to all men, as a gift to be received, to believed on for the receiving of eternal life, the very Spirit of God to come take residence in you.
So what about the heathen who has never head? First of all, the Spirit has gone out into all the world. There is nowhere His voice has not been heard. Even all creation testifies of a creator, so no man is without excuse. All creation testifies so that man might seek Him and ask, “Who made the trees? I know who made the idol. My father made the idol, but who made the trees.” God has promised that if any man truly wants to know Him, He will make Himself known to him. See, the beginning of faith is to know that God exists and that God is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. The wise shall seek Him. So how does God reward faith? He makes Himself known to Him, what He has provided for him through the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ, His only Son, so that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.
Listen now as Bob answers these and other questions by different callers. So what about my autistic son, who from time to time abuses himself and hits himself in the face. Did God cause that? No, that was a result of the fall of man in the garden of Eden. Our natural human emotion is fear, fear of all kinds of consequences of Adam’s sin, of pain and difficulty in this fallen world. But God wants us to look to Him, for He perfectly loving and just. But His love is what casts out fear. Perfect love casts out fear and when we are not made perfect in love, we tend to be overcome by fear. And anger is a secondary response to that fear. To deal with anger, you must first deal with fear. You deal with fear by boldly going to the throne of grace, to Him who is perfect love, so His love can be worked in you and through you. We cannot manufacture love, but it is the characteristic of the fruit of the Spirit that comes by abiding in Him. Then you learn how to not give into that anger because you come to comprehend that you have been given everything you need for life and godliness through the Spirit of truth who lives in you, who guides you into all truth.
Transcript
Bob from Detroit, MI
Caller: How do you find the will of God for your life? I have been doing what my passion is since I was 8 years old. So I want to know if this is the field I was supposed to go into.
Bob: We are a do do bunch of people. We are always thinking about the will of God in what we do.
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18
16 Rejoice always, 17 pray continually, 18 give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.
Bob: We do not have to worry about giving thanks in all things is the will of God. We are told it is. Why do we give thanks in all circumstances?
Romans 8:28
28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
Bob: The fact that if we will trust Him and walk in a dependent relationship with Him then He will guide us into all truth. If anything happens to us, we say thank you, not for the bad things that happened, but because He promised to cause it to happen for our good. That is how we know it is God’s will.
2 Peter 3:9
9 The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.
Bob: So God is not willing anyone should perish and all should come to repentance. It is His will they will but not all are going to. Not all will come to Christ and people will perish.
Galatians 5:6
6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.
Bob: He did not say one of the things that counts. The only thing that counts is faith in Him expressing itself in love to others. That is His will for you.
Caller: Exactly
Bob: That is His will, to walk by faith in Him, and to allow Him, who lives in you, to express His love to the people around you.
The caller quoted this scripture in Romans 10:17.
Romans 10:17
17 Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word about Christ.
Bob: Absolutely. Outside that I do not think He cares what you do. It is like the trees in the garden of Eden. You can eat any one you want to except one.
Genesis 2:17
17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”
Psalm 37:4
4 Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.
Bob: I believe that is one of the greatest ways for determining what I felt at the time God was leading me to do. I was delighting in the Lord and He was giving me a desire to leave the business world and go into full time Christian work. I followed those desires based upon that promise. God has certainly blessed through the years. I do not think there is a better way for a person to gauge what God would like you to do than that passage. That is how I follow my life.
Caller: You feel a pull to something from youth on up. I am an on-air personality. I have been playing with my record player since a child. I went to school. I wonder if this is something I want to do? I love it so much.
Bob: Are you like a disc jockey?
Caller: A radio personality. Yes, sir.
Bob: A radio personality is a very broad thing. What do you want to do on it?
Caller: I am working on the top 40 and use a rock station format. But God gave me the passion, and this purpose in my mind. He gave me the vocal cords to do what I do.
Bob: What is the problem? If you delighted in the Lord, you trusted Him, and you are in Christ trusting Him for your daily life. God certainly needs you in that business. I was ministering to a professional tennis player. A father had a daughter who was a professional tennis player. He had me come to speak to her. I do not know if God wants me playing tennis? Do you think God wants one of His children out on the tennis court? How else if the gospel going to be spread unless you are out there.? Do you think God wants somebody on radio? Of course He does. How will He get the gospel spread unless He has His people in all walks of life? Praise the Lord for that desire and follow up with it.
Caller: Yes sir. God bless you. Thank you for your time.
Fabian from Brownsville, TX
Fabian: What is the best way to pray for somebody for healing? Do you use olive oil? I heard praying with two people and that works best?
Bob: What you are saying is what works. What formula do I use to make something work? You do not have a formula to make something work. You cannot make something work if you wanted to. Everything is in the initiation of God, Fabian. He is the initiator of all things and we are the responder. I have heard these so called faith healers, if you ever pray in accordance with God’s will then you just negated the prayer. If that is case, then take that out of scripture. Anything we ask according to His will, there is the answer. You might as well rip that passage out and build your own bible. The issue is everything is at the initiation of God.
Bob: The issue is this, if I got a sickness. I have had sickness and other people have had sicknesses. My sister recently had cancer. So I say to God, “You know what my will is, and that is, my sister be healed. But I also know I am not interested in my will. I am interested in your will. For whatever happens I will praise you for it.” In essence, my sister gained ultimate healing. She died, and she left this sick body where it belongs, in the grave. Our role is to seek the will of God. If you think you are going to move the hands of God, you are not. God is not our slave. We are not greater than God. If I can tell God what to do and He was obligated to do what I wanted Him to do, then we would be greater than God, wouldn’t we? We are not greater than God. So what we pray is, “if it is your will. You know what is going on.” That is all you can do is to pray like that.
Fabian: I have seen a movie about Christ, Mary Magdalene who came to Jesus, and that guy that died and He brought him back to life. He did do it for her.
Luke 4:38-44
38 Jesus left the synagogue and went to the home of Simon. Now Simon’s mother-in-law was suffering from a high fever, and they asked Jesus to help her. 39 So he bent over her and rebuked the fever, and it left her. She got up at once and began to wait on them.40 At sunset, the people brought to Jesus all who had various kinds of sickness, and laying his hands on each one, he healed them. 41 Moreover, demons came out of many people, shouting, “You are the Son of God!” But he rebuked them and would not allow them to speak, because they knew he was the Messiah.
42 At daybreak, Jesus went out to a solitary place. The people were looking for him and when they came to where he was, they tried to keep him from leaving them. 43 But he said, “I must proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent.” 44 And he kept on preaching in the synagogues of Judea.
Bob: Remember after that event when Peter came out, that people are going out to be healed. Jesus said, “No, I am going to the next village to proclaim the gospel. I do not come here to heal people physically. I came to heal spiritually and to give life to the dead.” The issue is, Fabian, it does not make a difference how healthy you are, you are going to die. In the meantime, we are all going to die. All of us are going to die by an accident or by an illness of some kind. This idea that you can boss God around and tell Him what to do is ludicrous. That is how you have to look at it, Fabian. You are not looking at things by faith when you are demanding God to heal a person over there. It is a repudiation of faith. The issue is you pray in accordance with God’s will. I will accept any results that God brings our way. I am there ready to accept the results of those things. That is the attitude of the heart you have to have.
Fabian: Okay, that sounds really good. That is very helpful.
Bob: Alright my friend. God bless you, Fabian. Do you have a loved one who is sick?
Fabian: Yes. My mother has a virus and cannot use her legs.
Bob: We have all been through it. We are at that stage. Our parents are going through that period, in their age, where things begin to happen. I used to pray for my mom to go be with the Lord. She was in her 80 s. My mom was a beautiful woman, and lost all her teeth. She was down to 90 pounds. I used to leave the nursing home and cry like a baby. My heart was broken as to what mom was going through. I would say, “Lord, why do you not take her home rather than leave her suffering as she does.” Yet, I had to pray, “yet not my will but yours be done. If she is still here then you have a purpose for it.” That is how you have to handle things.
Fabian: That is really good what you shared. Thank you very much.
Bob: God bless you, pal.
Sam from San Demas, CA
Sam: A Muslim who has been born in Saudia Arabia, living there all his life, and has never been exposed to the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. If such a person dies, and introduced to Allah. I do not know if Allah is the same God as the bible. If such a person dies, where does he go? Does he go to heaven or to hell?
Bob: The issue is, as well as you know, that all of those countries were Christian nations at one time. A terrific amount of evangelism took place all over those countries after the death, burial and resurrection of Christ Jesus, until such a time as Mohammad came along and converted them to Muslims. You know how that took place as well as I do. It is not an issue of whether they are Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Catholic or Christian. Jesus did not come to convert people to a Christian religion any more than he came to convert them to a Muslim religion. He came to convert them to Himself as the only means to enable a person to come into the presence of God, alive spiritually.
Bob: In order to do that, He for the entire world, he came for the entire world, and went to a cross and took upon Himself the sins of the entire world. Whether a person is Muslim, Catholic, or Christian is irrelevant. The issue is you are a person and you are born into this world dead spiritually. That has nothing to do with religion. It is just the condition you are born into this world as a result of Adam’s fall.
And so death has to be corrected if God was going to correct it. He died to do that and did not have to. He could have left us all dead spiritually. He came to restore man to true humanity. That is all mankind, all people from all parts of the world. He came to restore them to true humanity whereby we can gain, in Christ, which we had lost in Adam, and that being the Spirit of God living in us. God in the man is indispensable to the humanity of the man irregardless of Chinese, Japanese, Russian, American, or German. That is irrelevant. It is man. Man is born dead and in need of life and the only life available to us is the resurrected life of Christ Jesus.
Bob: As you well know, in order for Him to raise us to life, He had to deal eternally with the cause of spiritual death, which was sin. Therefore, the eternal consequence of the cross is what enabled Him to offer eternal life to each and every one of us. When we have come to Christ for His life, it says this.
Ephesians 1:7
7 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace
Bob: We come alive spiritually. So, the only thing you and I have to go by is the truth that is revealed in the scriptures.
1 John 5:12
12 Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.
Bob: There is no Allah in the new or old testament. It is just the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. It is Elohim. It is Jehovah. There are numerous names of God, but they are all the same God. But you cannot make up a God and put a name to him and say you are going to heaven or hell because of that. The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God we worship, sent His Son to earth to tell man how to be saved. It is the rejection of the Son. It is not what name you apply to God. It is the rejection of the Son is what will cause spiritual death and for people to go to hell.
Sam: If the rejection of the Son is what would send us to hell, but this has been a person who never had a chance and was not presented with Christ.
Bob: I do not believe that at all. Everyone has been given the opportunity to accept Christ because otherwise they would not be rejecting Christ. The Muslims talk about Jesus but they deny His divinity. The Jehovah Witnesses in America, they certainly talk about Jesus, but they just deny His deity. The Mormons certainly have heard the gospel but they deny that Jesus Christ is the one true God. So it does not matter if you are living in America with a television set in every home or living over there, every one has had an opportunity to hear about Jesus. It is a rejection of Christ Jesus. To the Jews, the same thing. They teach Jesus in their schools but they teach him as a prophet. They will not teach him as the promised Messiah who came to take away the sins of the entire world and to give life to the dead.
Bob: So if there is any other way of salvation, or any other way to escape the consequence of hell, I do not know what it is, because the bible does not speak of it. The bible tells us that there is no other name given to men by which you can be saved, and that is Jesus Christ.
Acts 4:12
12 Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved.”
Bob: If there is any other way of salvation to take place, we have to put that in the hands of God, for it has not been revealed to us. If there is, God will have to pull that one off. But we are obligated to proclaim what God has revealed to us in His word. If there is any exception to that, then that goes into the hands of a perfectly loving and just God and He will make that decision, if there is any other way.
Sam: I understand what you said about the rejection of the Son. How about someone who is not a Muslim, but has not heard the gospel. Let us say he lives in a remote place somewhere. Such a person would be a person who does not believe in God. Then, in this case, that person would be judged by rejecting God but not rejecting Christ.
Bob: God says that if anyone wants to know God, Christ will be revealed to him. So we know there is no person like that on the face of the earth, who sincerely wants to know God. They may want to know God of their own making, but to sincerely know God. God has promised us that if one person on the entire continent wants to know Him, He will reveal Himself to him.
Jeremiah 29:13
13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
Hebrews 11:6
6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
Bob: I have an example of that. I met a person from Africa a number of years ago when I was a new Christian. Those questions come out, “What about the heathen in Africa who has never heard?” So I could not wait to talk to this guy on break. His name was Joshua. So I asked him, “What is the story there?” Joshua shared his testimony. “When I was a little boy, we used to worship idols made of trees. Our whole family and village would worship these idols. As a young man, I would say, ‘That is not God. I know who made the idol. My dad made it. What I want to know is who made the tree?’ I used to stand on a hillside, and would say to God, ‘I want to know you. I want to know who made the universe and the sky and who made the trees. I know who made the idol, but I want to know who made the trees.’ While I was in this remote village, asking God to reveal truth to me, God was putting on the heart of a missionary in New York City to come into my remote village and to lead me to Christ Jesus. That is exactly what he did. One day he walked in and told me about Jesus. I accepted Him and then led my whole village to come into a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. Now I am in Los Angelos trying to save the heathen in America.” There is a promise to us. If there is anyone truly seeking God, He will reveal Jesus to him.
Bob: If there are any exceptions to any of that, we have no record of it. We merely have to say if there is an exception, and I do not believe there is, then we put that decision into the hands of a perfectly loving and perfectly just God. In the meantime, the issue is what about the people who have heard that are rebelliously rejecting. There is the whole issue.
Sam: That one I know the answer. I am okay with that one. My question was people who had not heard. You have completely answered my question. I really appreciate that. I plan to witness to a Muslim. I wanted to see how to approach him. Thank you very much for your time. I really appreciate it.
Bob: You are sure welcome, Sam. Sam, thank you for your call. God bless you, Sam. Bye now.
Joshua from El Paso, TX
Joshua: A book called Paradise Lost by Sir Milton. Have you heard of it? I want to know how much truth was behind this book? I am 18 years old and I just heard about this book. I am a firm believer and I just wanted some clarification.
Bob: That is how a difficult thing to see, how much truth in the deal. Truth is, it is not the bible. It is not inerrant. I would not take any doctrine from the book unless the book is quoting directly out of the bible. Look at it for what it is. It is a novel. It is a good one, but it is not one for believers or unbelievers to sit down and try to form their doctrinal belief system on. There is where you have to go to the word of God in order to have the security that what you believe is truth based upon the word of God. It is not based upon what I say, or anyone else says. The bible itself has taught you. The Spirit of God, who is in you, has revealed to you the meaning of the word of God, as you allowed Him to do so. That is when you are really taught, Joshua. You really come down to the point where I would ask a question, “Is what you believe based on what someone has told you or can you honestly say that everything you believe about the word of God that the bible has taught truth to you. If not the latter, then you need to get down where it is the latter. You need to come to the point of saying, “I do not care what anyone else has taught me. It may be true but I do not know. I am starting over and I want you, Lord, to teach me the meaning of the grace of God and the meaning of the word of God.” Let God be your teacher.
2 Timothy 3:16
16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness
Ephesians 3:4-6
4 In reading this, then, you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, 5 which was not made known to people in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God’s holy apostles and prophets. 6 This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus.
2 Peter 1:21
21 For prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.
1 Corinthians 2:8-10
8 None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9 However, as it is written:“What no eye has seen,
what no ear has heard,
and what no human mind has conceived”[Isaiah 64:4]—
the things God has prepared for those who love him—10 these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.
Joshua: I totally understand. Thank you for clarification.
Bob: You are sure welcome, brother. Thank you so much. Bye Bye.
Kimberly from San Diego, CA
Kimberly: I so love the Lord. I know Jesus is the Lord and the only Lord. Yet there is this pervasive anger that simmers in my heart and forward to the Lord when my autistic son starts self abuse. He punches himself in the face and head. It has gone on now for 15 years, off and on. It shocks me every time it happens. Although I try to control this anger, I am unable to control it. I feel this deep anger and disappointment with the Lord. I must be nuts. There must be something wrong with me. How can I be saved and be like this.
1 John 4:18
18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love
Bob: Anger comes from fear. The perfect love of God is what casts away all fears. Satan has one goal. Satan wants to keep you from the perfect love of God. He uses fear and anger to do that. So when you realize that anger is a secondary response to fear, instead of dealing with the anger, deal with the fear. You are fearing. You are fearing your son, the consequences can be all kinds of things. Instead recognize the fact that God did not make your son that way. That came from the fall. That is one of the by-products, and not that your son was picked out but those things can happen. There is nothing wrong with experiencing that fear but do not let that fear turn into anger. Counteract that fear by grabbing a hold of the perfect love of God. When perfect love casts out fear and when fear is cast away then your anger will be cast away.
